Aside from stereo cards and stereo pairs in books, Brian May’s OWL stereoscope may also be used to view the growing number of 3D videos popping up on YouTube. Watching Wile E. Coyote getting the crap beat out of him by cruel karmic fate is hella fun when it feels like you’re in the video.

For those who don’t have a stereoscope, YouTube provides other 3D viewing options: red-cyan, green-magenta or blue-yellow glasses, interleaved rows, columns or checkerboard, monitor, or (of which I am biased for) stereo pair. No compatibility for the polarized glasses you’ve swiped from the cinema.

I’ve been watching these videos on the YouTube app for iPad, which presents the videos at a more-or-less correct fit for the OWL. Going full-screen is not an option. Now while side-by-side stereo pair viewing does reduce the aspect ratio from widescreen to something close to 4:3, it maintains the true color of the video. When you’re watching a Looney Tunes clip, true color makes all the difference.

If you’re interested in ordering a stereo viewer, you can order an OWL from the London Stereoscopic Company. Alternatively, you could either learn to freeview stereo pairs or construct your own viewer, here and here.

I was browsing the photography section at a local bookstore this afternoon when I stumbled upon a freshly stocked book titled Camera Creative. Written by Chris Gatcum, a former editor at What Digital Camera?, the book is a compilation of all the quaint tricks and techniques I’ve been dabbling in for the past few years – false tilt shift photography, light painting, lomography, plastic lenses, digital cross processing and then some.

Over four chapters, Gatcum describes 52 techniques/projects covering creative shooting, lens and accessory tricks, DIY lighting gear and the dark arts of digital post processing. Included are features on toy cameras and Holga hacks as well as el cheapo stereo photography, yay!

In the eight hours that I’ve owned this book I’ve only been able to read a few pages, but from what I’ve seen so far, Camera Creative is a great jump-off point for folks who like going against the grain. This isn’t a book for everyone, but the stuff in here will most definitely add a new unexpected dimension to your photography, if you apply the lessons well. There’s a lot of cool things to try out.

As for me, I can’t wait to have a go at TTV photography. TTV stands for Through The Viewfinder, where you mate your digital camera to a TLR and shoot the image that appears on the TLR’s viewfinder. Such a cool hack, methinks. Will definitely post results once I build my “contraption” (it seems this is what the TTV community calls the DIY interface) and shoot. Meanwhile, here’s a TTV flickr group to keep you occupied.

If you’ve got a bookstore near you, give it a look. Otherwise, there’s always Amazon.com.

I promised some of my readers that I’d post a 3D shot of the Aquino funeral cortege minus the epilepsy-inducing animation. So, I’ve prepared two versions of my favorite shot. The first (above this paragraph) is a stereo pair, which you can view using the cross-eyed technique or, if you print it out, with a stereo pair viewer. The second is a red-cyan anaglyph which you can view in 3D if you wear them funky 3D glasses.

Aquino Funeral Cortege Anaglyph

I actually prefer these two methods of rendering 2D photos into 3D over my sleight-of-eye animated shots. Using the proper gear or technique, your brain actually sees the image in stereo, just like you’d see in real life (if you have the use of both your eyes, that is).

On August 5, we bade goodbye to a remarkable woman named Corazon Aquino. Before she emerged as the first female president of the Philippines and the first female president in Asia after the 1986 People Power Revolution which saw the overthrow of dictator Ferdinand Marcos, “Cory” was a housewife and widow of the assassinated Senator Benigno Aquino.

While her presidency may have had its share of problems as well as triumphs, Aquino showed the world and, in particular, a nation that a people united can achieve great things.

She died on August 1, following a losing battle with colon cancer. On August 5, her body was brought from the Manila Cathedral to her resting place beside her husband Ninoy at the Aquino family mausoleum at Manila Memorial Park. The funeral procession took almost eight hours, with hundreds of thousands of Filipinos crowding the entire route to say a final farewell.

Here are a few 3D scenes taken along the South Superhighway as we waited for the funeral cortege to pass by.

Riders in Yellow

Bikers in Yellow

Perched

Umbrella Boys

Sibling Play

Yellow and Black

Passing Through

Flashing the LABAN Sign

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